Privacy Policy
Last Updated: November 21, 2025
Our Privacy Commitment
We collect only anonymous, aggregated usage data to improve our service. No personal information is stored—no names, email addresses, or accounts. We never sell your data or track you across the web.
This privacy policy explains exactly what data we collect, how we use it, and your rights. We believe civic participation requires trust, and trust requires transparency.
What We Don't Collect
Your Specific Address
We log that an address lookup occurred and which state it was in (for usage statistics), but we never store your actual street address, city, or zip code.
Your Specific Stance or Personal Stories
We track which general topics are popular (e.g., "healthcare" or "education"), but we never store your actual stance (support/oppose), personal stories, or any details you enter.
Your Letter Content
The AI-generated letters exist only in your browser. We never store the actual content of your letters.
Personal Identifiable Information (PII)
No email addresses, phone numbers, names, or accounts. You use our tool completely anonymously.
Tracking or Analytics Cookies
We don't use cookies, pixels, or fingerprinting to track your activity across the web or on our site.
What We Do Collect
We collect the absolute minimum data necessary to operate the service:
Server Logs (Temporary)
Our hosting provider (Vercel) automatically collects standard server logs including:
- IP address (anonymized after 24 hours)
- Browser type and version
- Date/time of requests
- Pages visited
Purpose: Security, debugging, and preventing abuse (rate limiting).
Retention: 7 days maximum, then automatically deleted.
Aggregate Usage Analytics
We collect anonymized, aggregated data for service improvement and monitoring:
- Total number of address lookups, bill searches, and letters generated (no content or details)
- General geographic distribution (state-level only, no specific addresses or cities)
- Which issue topics and bill types are most selected (to improve our topic and bill lists)
- API error rates and performance metrics (to identify and fix technical issues)
- Rate limiting violations (to detect and prevent abuse)
Important: This data is collected in real-time and stored temporarily in-memory. It is fully anonymized and cannot be traced back to you. IP addresses are used only for rate limiting and are never linked to your actions or stored long-term.
Access: Aggregated analytics are visible only to site administrators via a password-protected dashboard for monitoring service health and usage patterns.
How We Use Data
Operational Use: Your address is sent to the 5 Calls API to look up your representatives. Your issue and stance are sent to OpenAI to generate your letter draft. The specific content is not stored—only anonymized counts.
Security & Abuse Prevention: Server logs and IP-based rate limiting help us detect and prevent abuse (spam, attacks, excessive requests).
Service Improvement: Anonymous aggregate statistics help us understand which features are used and where to focus development (e.g., which topics are most popular, which states have the most users).
What We Don't Do: We never sell data, share data with third parties (except as required to operate the service like OpenAI and 5 Calls), or use data for advertising.
Third-Party Services
To provide our service, we use the following third-party providers:
OpenAI (AI Letter Generation)
When you request a draft, your issue, stance, and optional details are sent to OpenAI's API to generate your letter.
OpenAI's Policy: API inputs are not used to train their models and are deleted after 30 days.
OpenAI Privacy Policy →5 Calls API (Representative Data)
When you enter your address, we send it to the 5 Calls API to find your representatives. 5 Calls is a nonprofit civic organization.
Their Policy: They don't store addresses submitted via API.
Learn more about 5 Calls →Vercel (Hosting)
Our website is hosted on Vercel, which automatically collects server logs for security and performance.
Retention: Logs are automatically deleted after 7 days.
Vercel Privacy Policy →Data Security
We minimize data collection and implement industry-standard security practices:
- Minimal data storage: Only anonymous, aggregated usage statistics—no personal information that could identify you.
- HTTPS encryption: All communications between your browser and our servers are encrypted.
- Rate limiting: We prevent abuse by limiting requests per IP address.
- Open source: Our code is publicly auditable on GitHub—you can verify our privacy claims.
Your Rights
Since we don't store personal data, most data rights requests don't apply—there's nothing to access, correct, or delete. However:
- Transparency: You have the right to understand what data we collect (this policy).
- Questions: If you have questions about our privacy practices, contact us (see below).
- Open Source Audit: You can review our code on GitHub to verify privacy claims.
Children's Privacy
Our service is intended for general audiences. We don't knowingly collect data from children under 13. Since we don't collect personal information from anyone, and the service requires no account or registration, children can use the tool safely under parental guidance (e.g., in civics classes).
International Users
Take Civic Action is designed for U.S. residents contacting U.S. elected officials. Our servers are located in the United States.
If you use our service from outside the U.S., your data will be processed in the U.S. However, since we don't store personal data, this has minimal privacy implications.
Changes to This Policy
We may update this privacy policy from time to time. If we make significant changes, we'll update the "Last Updated" date at the top of this page and may notify users via a banner on the site.
We encourage you to review this policy periodically. Your continued use of the service after changes constitutes acceptance of the updated policy.
Contact Us
If you have questions about this privacy policy or our data practices:
Email: privacy@takecivicaction.org
GitHub: Report an issue